Kingdom Hearts: The Adventure Continues
by kairi's friend
Summary: I've been given back something from my past. What will happen when I face more challenges? What will happen to everything?
1. Chapter 1

Sorry for the wait. I finally got this part finished! Enjoy! And please leave comments!

I couldn't believe it's already been a year since we first discovered Kingdom Hearts. When we first got home, Derek, my brother, acted like it was all a dream, but everyone knew better. We traveled to Kingdom Hearts and ended up fighting to protect it. Annie, my sister, was relieved that we got Merlin's Talisman over with, and I agree with her. It was so hard finding all the ingredients, not to mention activating it when I couldn't even get hold of it. Mom's just happy she didn't end up with Kanapar, "the most powerful wizard of both worlds." It turned out he had a huge crush on Mom and was willing to kill anyone who got in his way to make her his wife. What made me loath him even more was the fact that he summoned millions of heartless to kill us all. I can often hear his last words echoing in my mind; "I'll be back…"

"Hey, Kiara!" Annie's words snapped me out of my thoughts. "Can you help me with a spell? It's a level two, and Mom won't help."

"You broke my chain of thought for that?" I snapped at her, perfectly annoyed. "You're still a level one witch, level two's too hard."

"Oh, come on. Please?"

"No, absolutely not. I've had enough witch training for today." I knew that was a bad excuse for not helping my sister, but I was too irritated to care.

Annie, though, knew what was wrong. "You can't get a hold of anyone in Kingdom Hearts, right?"

"No. Kairi said she'd call me tomorrow and get me caught up on news there. Tomorrow was three months ago. I wish that she'd just hurry up and call." As if on cue, my communication necklace starts "ringing." I immediately grab it and rub it (as that's the only way to turn it on). "Kairi?"

"Uh, no, Alice," I heard the person on the other end say.

"What are you calling for? I'm waiting for Kairi! Why doesn't she call anymore like she used to?" I was about ready to hang up.

"We need you to come back tonight. It's been a year since you guys left, and already we have a major issue on our hands. Please come ASAP. It's very important."

Already I sensed danger. "Should I bring anybody?" I asked, staring at my sister playing Kingdom Hearts II.

"No, well, not if you need to. Just make sure you bring the keyblade and your sister's box of cards."

"What? I can't take my sister's cards! I'll lose them!" I heard the doorbell ring. "I gotta go. Call you soon." I "hang up" the necklace by giving it a tap. "Come in!" The door opened to reveal my best friend, Briana. "Briana, what are you doing here?"

"I thought you said I could come over to study," she said in a surprised tone. I totally forgot I promised to study with Briana for the big test tomorrow.

"I'm so sorry, but something's come up and I can't study tonight. I'm sorry."

She glared at me. "Another family thing? You've been getting lots of those since last year. I think I know why, though."

Annie and I exchanged nervous glances. "You do?" I said in a weak voice.

"Yeah. You don't want to be my friend but you never say anything. I thought we told each other everything."

'That's not true,' I thought. 'I just don't want to reveal my secret yet.' "No, wait," I blurt out. "It's not that. I really like being your friend, but I can't study right now. How about next time?"

"That's what you always say. I'm leaving." Before she left, she noticed my bracelet with the keyblade attached. "When did you get this?"

'Oh, no,' I thought. "I got that last year as a gift from my grandma," I finally said.

She glared at me again. It was really starting to creep me out. "I thought your mom doesn't let you get Kingdom Hearts stuff. Now I see everything as Kingdom Hearts bracelets, games, costumes, even someone who looks like Alice outside the window."

I froze with fear. "A-Alice is r-right outside th-the window?" I stuttered. This was so very bad. I couldn't let my best friend know about this. I turn my head around. Sure enough, Alice was peering in through the window. Annie left the room so that she didn't have anything to do with this. "Oh, snap. Uh, Briana, you should probably leave now."

"What? No way. Not until I find out what's going on around here. Hey, stop pushing!" I pushed her out of the house before she says anything else about the subject. I rush over to the window and let Alice in, making sure Briana wasn't watching.

"Alice, what do you think you're _doing_? You almost cost me a friendship."

"Sorry, but it was very urgent that I come. Why did you hang up on me? I wasn't done."

"You call me right before my best friend comes over, and then you show up when she's still there? What kind of a friend are you?"

"I'm sorry. If it makes you happy, I'll leave and take care of the curse myself." She was about to leave when we heard a knock at the door. "On second thought," she whispered, "I'll hide." She squeezed herself behind the TV set. I opened the door and Briana was still there.

"Look," she started, "before you say anything else, I wanted to say I'm sorry."

"I've gotta…huh? What do you mean, 'I'm sorry?'" I was confused.

"I got really mad at you all because I never knew about this stuff, and it made me feel that I was losing a close friend. From now on, let's promise to tell each other the truth."

I thought for a moment. "Sure, come on in." In my head I was thinking, 'What the heck am I doing?'

"But, I thought you couldn't study. Why are you letting me in?"

"Because I'm gonna tell you my biggest secret." I led her into the family room. "Bri…I'm a witch." I pulled Alice out for the next thing I was going to say. "I'm from Kingdom Hearts. This entire family is."

Briana stared at Alice. "Alice is real?" she half-whispered. She shook her head. "Wait, you say you're a witch from Kingdom Hearts?"

I nodded. "I didn't want anyone to know just yet. That's why I didn't tell you anything. I'm sorry."

"No, it's okay. And it explains a lot."

"I don't mean to be rude," Alice interrupted, "but we have to take care of a really bad curse that's overcome Kingdom Hearts, so Kiara has to go now." She grabbed my wrist and started for the door.

"Wait!" Briana cried. We stopped in our tracks. "Can I help?" She made the puppy dog pout she uses to get people to help her, give her something, or let her do something (like stay up an extra half hour sometimes on school nights). The puppy dog pout is irresistible. We had no choice but to give in. "Yay! I finally get to use my martial arts for real!"

"Oh," Alice said gloomily. "This is a magic curse. Martial arts isn't going to really help." Briana frowned. I stepped into the conversation.

"But there might be a way you can help," I shared. "I don't know how, but maybe once we get there we might find a way." Briana smiled and threw her arms around my neck.

"Thank you so much, Kiara!" My lungs were quickly deprived of air and started to shrivel up from the lack of air and my face started turning blue.

"Choking, not breathing," I choked out. She quickly released her arms, allowing me to breathe again. "Thank you," I gasped as my lungs returned to normal. "Alice, get Annie and her cards. Briana, get me a glass of water." As Alice went down the hallway, Briana rushed into the kitchen, who returned quickly with a tall glass of fresh, cold water. I gulped it down as Annie and Alice joined us. "Okay. I'm better now. Alice, how did you get here?"

"I had to open up a portal that led to your house."

"So, if you created a portal, it should still be here, right?" Briana asked with an optimistic tone. Alice shook her head sadly.

"I opened one to get me here, not to stay here. I was hoping Kiara and Annie knew a way back." All eyes were on me.

"Don't look at me! I'm still a witch in training!" I shouted. Annie came running into the room. She was holding our grandma's book of spells.

"Boy, is this thing heavy!" she groaned as she handed it to me. "I overheard your conversation and thought this could help."

"Where'd you get it? Grandma isn't even here."

"I went into her room and swiped it. I'm sure grandma won't mind if we use it." She opened the book up and pointed to a spell. "Does this spell help at all?" I glanced at the spell. The spell talked of opening and closing portals.

"Yes! This should be able to help!" We all went outside into our backyard. I read the spell aloud. "_Portal, portal, open here. Send us far or send us near. Portal, portal, close behind. So that there's no portal to find._" Silver dust circled us, then came together in the trunk of the big tree in our backyard. The dust joined to form a silver portal. "Cool! Everybody jump in!" I jumped in first with everyone else following behind me. I pretended there was a board under me and started "surfing" through the silvery tunnel. It was fun! Soon, a wooden floor appeared below us. I crashed into it first, followed by Briana, Alice, and Annie (in that order). "Ow!" I moaned in agony. "Get off, get off, get off! You're gonna break my bones!" Everybody scrambled off me as I slowly stood up. I glanced around. Huey, Dewey, and Louie were staring at us. We crash-landed in their shop.

"You know, you could just use the front door," Huey said. "You didn't have to drop in." I gave a sarcastic glance at Huey's joke.

"Well, how else were we supposed to get here?" Briana asked. "We had to open a portal."

"No one ever asked you," Dewey snapped at her. He started squinting at her like he was trying to figure something out. "You don't look familiar. And we recognize everyone that comes into our shops. And you're not one of them."

"Uh, she's new around here," I butted in. "She's my friend from the mortal world." The three ducks gasped.

"A mortal?" they cried out at the same time. "Mortals aren't supposed to come here! That's why there are two different worlds! Let's get her!" They immediately charged for Briana. She really was a black belt, because she got them pretty good. A little too good. They had bad bruises and ruffled feathers all over. Louie dragged himself over to a button on the counter. He slammed his fist on it. A loud, and rather obnoxious, siren started blaring. Terrified, we ran out of the small shop and hid behind barrels as a rather large crowd rushed over to the shop.

"Oh, great," Alice whispered. "Now, we've got an angry mob after us."

"Technically, they're after Briana. Not us," Annie whispered back. Briana glared at her and gave a thanks-a-lot look. I peeked out from my barrel and saw the crowd splitting up. Some were heading our way.

"Everybody, duck down," I commanded. Everyone did. "And whatever you do, don't make a sound." We kept as silent as we could until everyone was gone. When the coast was clear, I stepped out first. No one was in sight. "Come on out." Everyone came out, all except for Briana. "Briana, please come out."

"No. I caused this whole fiasco, I'm ending it." I couldn't believe my ears.

"What? No, you're not. I thought you wanted to help."

"And I do. If that means turning myself in, then I'm willing to do it. Promise me you'll turn me in if I come out."

"I'm not gonna do this to my best friend. I told you my secret just like friends should and I'm not gonna let our friendship fall apart just because the world I'm from doesn't take kindly to pure mortals." My response was silence. "Briana? Are you there?" Still no response. I peeked behind the barrel she had been hiding behind, but instead of seeing my friend, I saw a black Shadow. "What happened to Briana?" I cried out as the Heartless attacked. I successfully dodged the attack, but Annie wasn't quick enough. As soon as she got hit, the Heartless disappeared. Alice rushed over to help Annie. Instead, Annie's hand shot out and grabbed Alice's wrist. An evil grin spread across her face. "Annie? What's gotten into you?"

"Don't you remember?" a terrifying voice said. I turned around. Right there in front of me was Kanapar. His clothes were as black as the Darkness he called upon last year. "Don't tell me the most powerful witch doesn't remember last year." I froze. "Ah, so you do remember."

"I _do_ remember. You used the Heartless to turn everybody evil. If it failed last time, it'll fail this time."

"That's where you're wrong, Kiara. I already have your sister. All that's left is you, your brother, and grandmother, then I'll be the most powerful wizard of all!" He gave an evil laugh as I rolled my eyes.

"You? 'The most powerful wizard'? That'll be the day!"

"You think you know so much, yet you understand so little. You might be the most powerful, but you are not the most wise." He knocked me against a wall as Alice screamed in fear.

"What makes me the most powerful witch?" I groaned with pain.

"You do not even know what makes you so powerful. Let me explain it in the simplest way I can." He grabbed me by my shirt's collar, then hoisted me up in the air. "I was more skilled than you when you first came to Kingdom Hearts, yet when I casted a spell on you, you broke free of it. And it was a very powerful spell, too. No one has been able to break free from a very powerful spell before." He threw me to the ground. I hit my head hard against the wall. I stared up angrily at Kanapar as he gave an evil laugh. My anger grew more and more powerful by the second. "Once you're out of the way, I'll use the Seven Princesses of Light to open the heart of Kingdom Hearts, where my darkness will spread undefeatable." Before he could do anything, I used all my anger as energy as I unleashed a series of attacks, ranging from simple spells to devastating combos. I never stopped until he collapsed. I panted as I watched him struggling to stand up. I turned toward Annie. She had a look of shock on her face and she was still holding Alice's wrist. Poor Alice looked shocked, too. I was about to walk over to her when I got hit in the back of the head with something hard. The last thing I heard was Alice's screams and Kanapar's evil laughter. Then my vision went black. I woke up when icy cold water got splashed on me. I was in a room where everything was mainly red, except the bed that I was on, which was white. I looked around at the strange-looking people surrounding me. I got a splitting migraine. I placed my hands on my head.

"I don't think she's okay," I heard one of the people say. I didn't bother checking to see who it was.

"Well, what do you think? We saw her get attacked by that maniac," another replied. This time, I was curious to see who spoke. I took my hands away and looked around me. I didn't recognize any of the people. One was a girl with red hair, a white shirt, a purple skort (part skirt, part shorts), a black armband, and a few bracelets; another one was a dog in a green shirt, yellow pants, a green shield with a black Mickey Mouse face, white gloves, and a green-and-yellow hat; and the last one was a woman wearing a fancy yellow dress, yellow gloves that went up to her elbows, and brown hair that was pulled up in a fancy way. They were all smiling at me. My head hurt so bad I bent my head down low and groaned. "Are you ok?" the red-haired girl asked.

"Not really," I moaned in response. "I've got a very bad migraine." The dog held out a tall glass of water. I gave an unsure look at the glass, then at the dog.

"Don't worry," he said in a dorky kind of way. "It's just fresh water." I slowly stretched out my hand and curled my fingers around the cold, smooth surface. I slowly drew my hand back in as I tilted the glass towards my parched mouth. I gulped it down while I was trying to remember what happened. When the last drop had been sipped, I felt my migraine melt away a little. "Did it work?"

"A little. Thanks." I paused in deep thought, debating whether to ask them the one question nagging at me inside my head. I decided to ask. "I hope you don't mind me asking but…who are you guys?"

"You don't remember us, Kiara?" the lady in the yellow dress asked disappointedly. I stared in shock and horror. How did these people know me when I didn't know them?

"You all know me?"

"Of course we do," the red-haired kid said. "How could you not…. Oh, snap." The other two looked at her, waiting for her response. "That blow was a memory wiper. She doesn't remember anything."

"Remember what? What's going on?" I abruptly sat up, which wasn't a smart idea. A searing pain splurged into my side. I glanced and saw a deep cut that was bleeding. "Oh, this doesn't feel very good," I groaned. Everyone stared in horror. The kid ran to a nearby table, where she grabbed a blue jar with a single green leaf. She hurried back over to me, where she thrust the jar in my hands and told me to drink it all. I did and my cut went away. The pain subsided. "Thanks."

"No problem. You saved us last year, so it's the least I can do." I gave a confused look. "I forgot you don't remember. Sorry."

"No worries. But who are you guys?"

"I'm Kairi," the red-haired girl introduced.

"I'm Goofy," the crazy dog said.

"I'm Belle," the fancy lady explained.

"Oh, thanks. Uh, what's going on?"

"To make things short, there's a terrible curse on our world by Kanapar and we really need your help to break it," Kairi told me.

"My help? What can I do?"

"You don't remember it, but you defeated him before," Belle explained. "He wanted to rule both the mortal world and this world, but you foiled his plans."

"But how can I help?"

"You still have your bracelet, right?" Goofy asked. Without thinking, my hand dove into my right jean pocket, where I grabbed my bracelet and pulled it out. I was holding a woven bracelet with a small key with a gold handle and silver body. "Hey, there's something you remembered."

"What's so special about this bracelet, though?"

"That key is really the powerful Keyblade," Kairi took over. "It's used as a weapon, casting spells, activating Merlin's Talisman, and sealing worlds. It's disguised as a charm, but grows to full size when you need it."

"Whoa." There was an awkward silence. "What's this about a curse?"

"It's worse than last time," Belle worried. "Heartless appeared and attacked everyone. Anyone who was touched by them became instantly evil. That was just the beginning. Now, if anyone gets touched, they turn into a Heartless if they're not given the antidote in time."

"'Kay, this does not sound good."

"It wasn't then," Goofy explained. He seemed frightened about something. "You were the only one who broke free of his most powerful spell. No one even knows how. Now, he came back to get his revenge on you. The more that fall under his curse, the more powerful he becomes. But you don't even remember how you broke the spell last year."

"Well, she'll figure it out sooner or later," Kairi assured. Everyone looked at me. "We really need your help. Kanapar's already set out to spread his darkness amongst this world. We need your help to protect these worlds and stop Kanapar. Will you help?"

I fell silent. I just met these people and already they knew who I was and about something that happened last year. I wanted to say no, because I didn't know these people very well. But then I recalled that they said I got hurt in a way that wiped my memory. Maybe if I helped these people, I could recover my lost memory. I gave a small smile and nodded. "Sure. I'll help." I got off the bed (and good riddance, the bed was soaked from the splash of water). "Where do we start?"

"There are a whole bunch of worlds within this one big world, so we'd better get started," Belle said. "Follow us." I followed them out of the room, out of this hotel, and into another district of the place. I followed them to the tall, wooden doors on the other side of the district. "This is the first world you've arrived at, but we couldn't find the keyhole, so we'll come back to this one." Goofy pushed open the doors where a blinding flash of light appeared. I shielded my eyes from the light as I felt something underneath me. I was sitting on something. I removed my hands and saw what appeared to be an airplane cockpit. I was in the driver's seat, Kairi was on my right, Goofy was behind her, and Belle was behind me.

"Welcome aboard the Gummi Ship," Goofy announced. "This is how we get from one world to another. The worlds that are affected will appear dim, so we don't really know which world is which. But once a world is sealed from the Heartless, they'll appear brighter, so we'll be able to recognize it. Use the wheel to steer the ship and that yellow button to fire the guns. That green button to the right of the wheel fires the cannons (but only fire them when there are huge enemy ships), and that blue button to the left of the wheel initiates invisibility."

"Why am I doing this? If you know so much about it, why aren't you doing it?"

"Because it's more fun to watch someone drive when they're not experienced."

"Don't worry," Kairi said. "I'll help you whenever you get stuck."

"Thanks," I smiled as I faced the windshield. Thin, purple squares and small, yellow ovals started flying towards us. I felt horror and panic fill every empty spot in my body and my smile vanished. "What's that?"

"Those are Heartless ships," Belle pointed out. "You need to destroy those or they'll get backup. Then we're in trouble." I glanced at the buttons. Thanks to stress and panic, I couldn't remember which one fired the guns. I tried the blue button, which made us invisible to the Heartless.

"Oops. Wrong button." Now, it was down to yellow and green. One was for the guns and one was for the cannons. I squeezed my eyes shut as I pressed the yellow button. I heard a sound like something was exploding. I opened my eyes and saw all but one Heartless ship destroyed. I gave a sigh of relief. "I found the gun button." The one Heartless ship that wasn't destroyed grew bigger. Its guns shot with a bit more power than when it was smaller.

"Oh, snap," Kairi said in panic, her eyes wide open. "We've got ourselves an Exchanger."

"A what?"

"A type of Heartless ship that absorbs gunfire and cannon fire and uses it as energy. I read about it in a book, but I never thought we'd have to face one. And the book said that there's no sure way to defeat one." I glared at the Exchanger that was advancing toward us. Absorbs weaponfire, huh? There had to be a way to defeat one. But how? Ignoring the Exchanger, I steered the Gummi Ship away, doing a few flips by accident. Hey, I was still learning how to fly a Gummi Ship. Cut me some slack. Anyway, I steered us toward a blackened object.

"Here's an infected world," Belle announced as she and the other two straightened up in their seats. "Let's disembark here." I nodded my approval as I looked at the many buttons. I found a red one in the center of the dashboard that had "Disembark" over it in red letters. I pressed the button and relaxed as the ship lowered into the darkened world. It stopped, though, as it reached the surface, spitting us out. I thought we were gonna get swallowed by the darkness of the world and would be unable to escape. When we passed through the sky, though, everything changed from dark and gloomy to colorful and happy. We were in some sort of room.

"Bizarre," I gasped in awe. Half of the things in the room were 3-D, the rest was all 2-D. The many things found in the room were a grandfather clock, a bed, a fireplace, pictures on the wall, a chair against the wall, and a book. There was only one way out-and that was through the rather small door. I grabbed the doorknob and gave it a turn.

"Ow! Do you mind?" I let go and stepped back in shock. The doorknob spoke. "I was trying to get some sleep."


	2. Wonderland

Sorry for the wait. It took me a while to write this chapter. Also, this chapter might be a little weird, but that's because I've been getting over writer's block. Anyways, I greatly welcome suggestions and comments!

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I stared at the doorknob in shock. "D-Did you just t-talk?" I stumbled over my words.

"Yes, I can talk. Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to get some sleep. I haven't had any since the Darkness took over this world."

"That's why we're here," Kairi said as she stepped forward. "We're here to get rid of it for you."

"Oh, hello, Kairi. Well, it's nice of you to get rid of it for us, but I'm afraid you can't do it by yourselves."

"What do we have to do to destroy it here?"

"Find the Keyblade, of course."

"But we already found the Keyblade," Goofy butted in. "It's right here." He pointed to the charm on my bracelet.

The doorknob stared in shock. It seemed wide-awake now. "So you're the one everyone's been talking about."

"I am?" I asked confused.

"Yes. You're that witch from last year that saved Kingdom Hearts. Now you're back to defeat it again. Just push in that bed over there and the entrance will be open." I looked at the blue bed that was on our left. How could you "push in" a bed?

Goofy noticed my uncertainty, so he whacked it with his shield, causing it to flatten against the wall. Where the head of the bed used to be against the wall was a small hole. "Now what?"

"Try the bottle, naturally." I was _so_ confused. First, we have to "push in" a 3-D object into 2-D mode, now we have to try a bottle that was nowhere to be seen? As if to answer my question, a table appeared in the center of the room with a blue bottle and a red bottle on top. Goofy pushed me toward the table, like none of them wanted to do it. I had no idea what each bottle did, but the only way to find out was to pick one. But which one? I finally chose blue, since it's my favorite color. I slowly brought it to my mouth and tilted a small amount inside. I felt like fire was burning in my stomach. The next thing I know I'm three inches high. I looked up at my friends. They were as shocked as I was about what the bottle did. Each of them took cautious sips, and each of them shrunk in size. "Well, now," the doorknob startled us from behind. "I knew you'd find the right bottle. Now, we know which one it is."

"You mean you didn't know?" I asked with an irritated look. We were now as tall as the doorknob.

"Well, I can only summon the table, not drink from the bottles. The last time I summoned the table, I forgot to see which one it was for future references." I put my right elbow in my left hand, and my forehead rested in my right hand. As you can tell, I'm very irritated after handling stress. "But now you can go fight the Darkness. I don't know where it is, but I do know where it went. Follow that path to the Lotus Forest."

"Thank you," Belle kindly said. Everyone started for the hole, which we were small enough for, but I lingered on that spot a little bit longer, giving a soft glare at the doorknob. Finding out that my memory had gotten wiped was bad enough, now I was being messed around by a doorknob. Finally, I walked toward the others, still glaring at the doorknob, then as I got closer I turned around. I stepped through the dark hole to follow the Lotus Forest path. I ended up stepping out onto a grassy field surrounded by hedges. Kairi was pacing back and forth in front of another hole, a worried look on her face. I timidly walked up to her.

"Kairi?" I asked softly, startling her.

Kairi sighed in relief. "It's you. At first I thought you were one of the manipulated."

"Huh? Who are the manipulated?"

"You know how we told you that Kanapar wants to turn everyone evil?" I nodded. "Well, they're the manipulated. They just came by, now they're fighting Goofy in that area." She pointed at the hole nearby. "Belle went to look for the Darkness. I sure hope she's okay," Kairi half-whispered, an apparent tone of fear showing in her voice.

"Is anything wrong?" I asked. I wanted to make sure things were ok, even though I hardly remembered these people.

"Nothing," Kairi said quickly. She looked at me again, then continued her nervous pacing. I stared at the hole, wondering what was happening in that area. My curiosity got the better of me and I went through, despite Kairi's pleas to not. I emerged in a room that had a tall tree in the center; tall, long, looming blades of grass in yellows and reds; round leaves ranging from big to small, low to high; and yellow and red flowers were scattered along the grass. Goofy was fighting hearts and spades cards that were advancing on him. So _these_ were the manipulated? I felt something on my wrist move. I glanced down to see the charm on the bracelet increasing in size until it was big enough to bash around. Luckily, no one noticed. I crept up behind the cards and then whacked them as hard as I could with what my friends called the Keyblade. Some of the cards swung their weapons at me, which I barely dodged. I continued whacking them in combos of three and four. When all of them had collapsed, I ran over to Goofy to see if he was ok. Before anyone could speak, the sound of bells and chimes could be heard from the breeze that carried into the room. I looked up. Something shiny was swirling around above. Whatever it was started descending towards us. It was a piece of ribbon with a charm that was a heart with curled ends-a necklace. I reached out to touch it; only thing was it was transparent, so all I could touch was air. As soon as I had "touched" it, it vanished.

"What was that about?" Goofy asked in his usual dopey voice.

I just stood there, staring off into deep space, not sure about what it was either. But something inside of me told me that it was very crucial if I were to save these people. I was thinking about the necklace when I felt a thin hand on my shoulder. I gasped and whipped around to see who the unexpected person was. As soon as I had turned completely around, someone grabbed me by the shoulders and had a firm grip. It was one of the spade cards. I thought we defeated them. I glanced behind him-all the collapsed cards were reviving. I made sure I had the Keyblade ready incase these cards dared to attack us. "Don't attack us, please," the card begged. It was almost like he read my mind. Bizarre. And what was even more bizarre was the fact that objects could talk. First the doorknob, now the cards. "You need to help us before the Darkness comes again!" He started shaking me.

"Leave her alone!" Goofy shouted, holding his shield up for attack.

The card finally stopped shaking me, let go, and faced my friend. "Oh, thank god it's you, Goofy! We thought we were done for when the Darkness came!" This seemed to calm Goofy's anger, because he lowered his weapon a little. "Please, we need your help again!"

'Again?' I thought. Then I recalled what the doorknob said; "The last time I summoned the table, I forgot to see which one it was for future references." What happened last time? So much was happening to me then that I was getting another migraine, worse than the one in the hotel room. I heard someone scream and I looked up. No one seemed to have heard it or they'd want to know who it was. My gaze darted from flower to grass to tree, then to another flower to more grass, then to a pond to a leaf to another leaf to a rock. The rock was cube-shaped, so I felt compelled to check out the abnormal rock. But, then again, _nothing_ in this world seemed normal. I walked away from the cards and Goofy and towards the rock. I reached out a hand to touch the smooth surface. I was about to turn back when I happened to see some black behind it. Curious, I pushed it with all my strength-but the rock wouldn't budge. I swung the Keyblade at it in anger and frustration. The rock moved a bit. 'Whoa. Maybe I have to hit it.' So, I swung the Keyblade some more until it moved away completely to reveal another dark hole. Man, how many of these were there? I looked back and saw Goofy was now talking to three spade cards and four hearts cards, the remaining five cards were still reviving. It was so awkward back there, so I decided to put all that behind me and find some way to get away from these people. This time, when I went through, all I could see was darkness. I took a step forward-yep, I was still on the ground and conscious. But that didn't explain why the room was so dark. "Hello?" I called out.

I heard that scream again. "Kiara!" I heard someone call. I froze on that spot. I recognized that voice.

"Belle! Where are you?"

"It's the Darkness! It's here!" Before I could say anything else, a red and black smoke appeared out of nowhere. Many scary faces would occasionally come out. The face looked somehow familiar. All of a sudden, a pair of huge hands form out of the smoke-and try to grab me! I jumped out of the way. An eerie, howling wind blew in from somewhere, but all I could see was the black emptiness and the threatening smoke. It lunged for me again, which I barely dodged. When the hands came by a third time, I started whacking them with the Keyblade, hoping this would help. It felt like I was trying to cut blue cheese with a dull knife every time. The hands eventually drew back, and they started to disappear. I smiled. I was winning. Unfortunately, the smoke didn't want that, so it summoned a tall, metallic thing with five heads stacked on top of each other and juggling sticks. I stared at the thing that was towering over me. I took a few steps back, then I turned around and ran, ran as fast as I could to escape. When I had gone ten yards, I ran into something that shimmered. I took a step back, then reached a hand out. The light returned-it was a force field. It was keeping me from leaving. Then, the entire floor lit up to reveal a big, yellow, stain-glass tiled floor. There was a lady wearing a yellow dress and had her brown hair in a fancy hairstyle and there were pictures around her that silhouetted many pots, pans, and other utensils. The lady was Belle! But then, what was with the silhouettes around her? Could it help? I wasn't paying any attention to the smoke and the metal-thing, so I got knocked back against the force field. I stood up, rubbing the arm that had gotten bruised, and glared at the enemies. The metal thing disappeared, but the smoke didn't. After one more lunge, I unleashed lots of attacks, not stopping to rest one bit. Finally, the smoke evaporated. When it cleared up, I noticed that I was in a garden with a long, pink table with seven different kinds of chairs around it. At the end furthest from me was a picture in an antique-looking picture frame. It was of a short man with wild white hair, buck teeth, a big top hat, a green jacket, big shoes, and yellowish pants; and a rabbit with long ears (and I mean really long), a patch of hair-like fur in between both ears, a red jacket, and orangeish pants. Both of them looked scared. I noticed a much smaller picture to the right. I went over and examined it. It said, "A Merry Unbirthday. Sit in a chair to get your present." I didn't get the "unbirthday" part, but if you get free presents by picking a chair, I wanted to be part of it. Maybe it could help me find Belle.

I chose the brown, wooden chair right next to me. As soon as I sat down, a small, red box appeared. I opened it-inside was a blue jar with a single green leaf, similar to the one Kairi gave me back at the red hotel room. The box disappeared, leaving behind a red mist, which disappeared, too, as it vanished inside my pocket. I moved to the next chair on my left, a tall chair that was really cushiony and soft. This time, a blue box appeared, and inside was an orange shard, like there was fire moving inside it. Just like the red box, the box vanished, leaving behind a blue mist that disappeared into my other pocket. The next chair was a wooden rocking chair, and the gift this time was a blue jar with a gold flame, which vanished into the same pocket as the other jar. I received a package that read "Cottage" from the stool. A blue shard disappeared into my pocket when I sat on the rolling chair. But when I sat on the big, red chair, the table and chairs disappeared and the smoke reappeared. I got out the Keyblade and prepared to fight, except it didn't seem like it wanted to fight. Instead, it summoned a whole bunch of small creatures with yellow dots for eyes. The smoke disintegrated as the swarm came closer. I swung at each one with my weapon, causing each creature to vanish, leaving a bunch of green balls. But as I destroyed one, two more would replace it. Finally, when I thought I could fight no longer, the creatures disappeared, leaving behind a lot more green balls. The more green balls I gathered, the stronger I felt. The extra balls all came together to create a green mist that vanished into the same pocket as the jars. After some time, the table and chairs returned. I sat in the very last chair, the kind that you can find in elementary classrooms. A treasure chest appeared out of thin air and opened mysteriously. Inside was a glowing red ball, a metal, Mickey Mouse-shaped charm attached to the end of four links that was decorated with a red/pink/white heart, and a pack of cards bordered in regular blue. There were seven cards with a picture on each one: an orange and yellow fire, a light blue snowflake, a yellow lightning strike, a clearish clock, a whitish tornado, a black and dark purple ball, and a green leaf (similar to the one on the bottle). These didn't vanish at all. Instead, part of the handle of the Keyblade opened up, allowing the cards to store there. I put the cards in, then closed the part. What was with the glowing red ball? I picked it up and held it in my hand, staring at it, wondering what I should do. The ball started pulsing and it was glowing brighter. I felt lots of heat being emitted from the ball as it lit up like fire, then extinguished itself. Ignoring the bizarre situation, I turned around-and saw a house with a real door this time. Relieved that it wasn't a dark hole, I went towards it and opened the door-only to find a dark hole inside. I growled; I was getting tired of these dark holes. The glowing ball came into my mind. It gave off a lot of light. Maybe it could light up the hole. Concentrating on the ball, I aimed the Keyblade straight at the middle of the hole. Instead of light, fire shot out of the Keyblade, disappearing into the hole as if it were never-ending. After the tiny speck of fire disappeared from sight, the entire hole lit up, revealing the strange room that we had came through earlier, except it was much bigger because we drank the shrinking potion. A pink and purple striped cat was lounging on the top of the table that was still in the middle. It apparently had drank the potion, too. I climbed onto the chair next to the table, which gave me a helpful boost to jump onto the table itself. "Shoo! This place is not safe right now!"

"Then why are you here?" I stepped back. Did the cat just speak? "Don't think I don't know you, Kiara."

I sighed, shook my head, and turned away. "How come _everyone_ knows me, but _I _don't know everyone else?"

"_You_ know more about _us_ than _we_ do ourselves." I turned around, only enough to see the cat. "You just don't remember. You will remember us, I know it…"

"What do you know about my memory?" I was completely facing the cat now.

"I know that you lost it when you got hit by Kanapar in the fight." I gave him a confused look. I did remember getting hit, but not during a fight. "You don't remember, do you?"

"Well, if you know so much, why don't you tell me?"

"The Cheshire Cat knows it all, but tells so little. If you really want to know the answer, why don't you find it yourself?"

"But once you forget something, it's impossible to remember it again."

"It's hard, yes, but not impossible. But, if you want to know that badly…" BOOM! A tall, thin metallic thing dropped from the ceiling and jumped towards the back. I turned back around to ask the "Cheshire Cat" what was going on-but he wasn't there. He seemed to have vanished into thin air. I looked back towards the thing. Five heads, three red, two black; long, flailing black arms carrying two juggling sticks; and legs made of four steel bars, two per leg. It was the thing the dark smoke had summoned earlier. Every step it took caused the floor to vibrate. I wobbled on the table a little as I tried to figure out what to do. I remembered the potions: one was to make you small while the other made you big. Maybe if I drank the other potion, I could be the same size as the creature and defeat it easily. I turned back around-the potions weren't there. The thing jumped so close to the table I almost fell off from the earthquake-sized vibrations. I slowly regained my balance as I remembered the blue cards with the different pictures on them.

I pulled them out of the Keyblade as I looked at them, deciding which one to try first. The one that came into mind first was the lightning bolt. I took it out. As I held it, it started shaking, the Keyblade shaking along with it. It seemed as if a magnetic bond was pulling the two together, but they did, and thrust themselves above my head. One lightning bolt hit the monster in one of its faces, causing it to fall. I smiled. "So that's how it works here," I whispered to myself. This time, I chose the black and purple ball, so the same kind of ball appeared, bigger, and forced the creature down, zapping some of its strength away. When it stood up, it hunched over, like it was tired. This was my opportunity. I ran across the table and started whacking the thing with the Keyblade. After a while it stood up again, angrier than before. With one wave of its juggling sticks, the table disappeared, along with the chair. I fell to the ground. I moaned in pain as the thing brought one of its sticks down upon me. It made contact with me, feeling like a thousand red-hot knives were slicing my insides, which would freeze instantly. It drew its sticks back, and I felt so miserable. I hadn't felt this much pain in my life. It swung its sticks again, only this time I rolled out of the way. It hurt to do so, but it would've hurt more if I got hit again. I stumbled a little as I tried to stand up. When I was up completely, I glared at the creature. This thing tried to _kill_ me. I did not like that one bit. I took the cards with the fire and the lightning and brought them and the Keyblade over my head. In an instant, the fire melted part of the creature away while the lightning made the rest of it crumble. It made lots of noise as it disintegrated. When it was all over and the chair and table returned, I felt like I wanted to collapse. I almost did; luckily I caught myself before I could touch the ground. I remembered that when I felt pain back at the hotel, Kairi gave me that jar, and I had one in my pocket. I reached into my pocket and touched something cold and smooth. I pulled it out-it was the same blue jar with the single green leaf I drank earlier. I drank it in big gulps, each bringing strength and energy back to me. When I was all done with the drink, I felt as good as new. The jar disappeared as I heard bells and chimes. I looked up and saw the same swirling mist I saw earlier. The necklace appeared and drifted down to me again. Only this time, it didn't disappear. When I grabbed it, I felt like someone let go of my mind, like they had been holding on for a while and let go a little. A scene passed by in front of me. A girl was sitting on a couch rubbing her necklace, then voices could be heard on the other side. It was as if the necklaces were telephones. I took a closer look at the girl sitting on the couch. The girl was me. I blinked a little as the scene vanished and I saw the tall table and chair again. Across where I was standing was the dark hole, still in the wall, and to the right of that was the annoying doorknob. He was staring at me.

"That's some fighting you did," he said, amazed. "And you didn't even have that much experience either. Simply fantastic!"

"Kiara!" I looked toward the black hole. Kairi, Goofy, and the cards were coming out. It was Kairi that spoke. "We heard all the commotion and were just coming to help."

"Why are they with you?" I motioned to all the cards. "They tried to kill us."

"It wasn't our fault," one of them blurted out. "We got infected by the darkness which turns us evil. We knew that you were the only one to help us since you blocked the darkness' spell last year, so when we turned good again, we knew it was because of you."

"Why is everyone saying that I did something to the darkness last year? I didn't to anything exciting! I would've remembered it!"

"Actually, you wouldn't remember something like this if you got the memory wiper," Goofy stepped in. "And you got a pretty bad wipe."

"Hey!" Kairi cheered. "You found your necklace!" I stared down at the necklace. So this _is_ mine. I wondered if I could use it to talk to my friends, just like I did in the vision. I tied the ends around my neck as I tried to remember how to use it. "Now we can talk to each other again!"

"You rub it to start talking, right?" I asked. Everyone stared with open eyes at me. (Man, I did not like it when that happened.)

"You remember how to use it?" Kairi gasped.

"I wouldn't be surprised, her eyes were glowing just before you came in here." It was the doorknob talking. I gave him a confused look as if to say, "What are you talking about?" (You think about it. How could my eyes be glowing when all you could see in the room at that time was a vision of myself?) "It's true. Right after you got that necklace of yours, your eyes started glowing. Seems to me like you were having a vision."

"But how could my eyes be glowing when-"

"Sometimes when people are having visions of things that already happened or will happen, they don't realize that their eyes start to glow. It happens to everyone that gets them, not just you."

"We'd better get going," Kairi said. "We already cleared out all the Heartless here, but there are many more."

"I'm afraid the Heartless will only return after a while," the doorknob sympathized. "You have to find the heart of the world and seal it, so that the world is locked from the Heartless forever. Why don't you lock this world right now?" The doorknob opened its mouth wide enough to reveal a keyhole. The Keyblade started vibrating as white light gathered at the tip. The Keyblade shoved itself forward, sending the light into the keyhole. When the light stopped, the doorknob shut its mouth again. "There you go. Now you have to take care of the other worlds. Good luck."

As everyone drank the potion from the red cup this time, causing them to grow, they left through the other door at the other side of the room. Everyone, that is, except me. I stayed behind. I had some things to talk about with the doorknob. "Something troubling you?" he asked, as if he knew what the problem was.

"It's just that…uh…. Maybe it's better if I showed you." I pulled the Mickey Mouse-shaped thing out of my pocket and held it up for the doorknob to see.

"You found a keychain! Good for you! What you do is you hook that last link to the Keyblade, and the Keyblade will change its form and power! Very handy things, keychains. This one is called Lady Luck. Use it whenever you're attacked by the manipulated. It'll help out a lot during those battles."

"Wow. Thanks." I hesitated. There was one more thing that was on my mind. "Did you, by any chance, hear a lady scream?"

"No, not that I can remember. Why, are you looking for someone?"

"Well, it's just that when Goofy was talking to the cards, I heard someone scream, but no one else did. Then, I entered another room, and I found out that the person screaming was Belle. So, I was wondering if you've seen her."

"Now that you mentioned it, I have. About a minute or so after you disappeared through the hole, Belle ran back through and was chased by monkey-looking things. Unfortunately, they caught up to her and captured her. As she was dragged away, she called out for you. You must've heard her, because you were shouting for her. She warned you of the darkness, then she was taken away. I hope she's okay."

I just stood there, completely in shock. They took Belle? Who were they? And, most importantly, why? I had to find her, and those monkeys were seriously gonna pay. "Do you know where the monkeys are?"

"The monkeys are a type of Heartless. I can't remember their names exactly, but watch out for them. I have no idea where they went, but I do know they work for Kanapar. So, maybe, if you find their hideout, you'll find Kanapar. But you'd better hurry, the more worlds that are destroyed, the greater Kanapar's power becomes. Then he'll be able to unlock any world. If you ever need any help, don't be afraid to come back."

"Okay. See you later!" I called out as I rushed up the chair, jumped onto the table, drank some of the potion from the red cup, and ran through the other door. Kairi was waiting for me next to a glowing, green circle that was spinning on the ground.

"I was wondering where you were," she smiled. "This is a gummi point. They're scattered throughout the many places throughout the worlds. If you step into one, you're fully healed, and sometimes they take you back to the gummi ship. Of course, you have to step into a point three times in a row to get back to the ship."

"Okay," I said as I stepped in. I stepped out as I asked, "Where's Goofy?"

"Oh, he's with the cards. They're looking for Belle." I frowned and cast my glance downwards. "What's wrong?" I told her what happened to Belle. "Oh, no," Kairi gasped with wide eyes. "The Heartless are after us. They already have one, now they need the rest."

"How can we protect ourselves?"

Kairi pondered for a second. "Well, I hear that they're attracted to the power of the Keyblade, but I'm not sure if that's true or not. They mainly go about, searching for people's hearts and steal them, leaving a lifeless shell, which later turns into a Nobody, but they haven't been around for a while."

"What's a Nobody?"

"A Nobody is a person whose heart has been stolen from them. They start searching for other people's hearts, to replace the one they lost. But they haven't been around for a long time. Besides, no one really knows if the Heartless _are_ attracted to the Keyblade. It's just a theory that's been around since the Keyblades."

"There's more than one?" I stepped once more into the circle, then back out.

"That's another rumor. Again, no one knows if it's true that there are more Keyblades. A true Keyblade has to fit specific standards: it has to be based after a type of key, it has to be able to attach keychains, and it has to be used for other than as a weapon. So far, there's only been one Keyblade. We should get going. We have to lock all the other worlds, too. Not just this one. We'll come back and get the others later." We both stepped in at the same time and ended up back in the cockpit. We took our original seats as we steered the ship away from the abnormal world. As we got farther away, we could see the world more clearly. It had a mushroom patterned with hearts, cards were coming up the side of the mushroom, a hedge, a castle, a tree growing at the bottom, and a house hung upside-down on the bottom of the world.

We took off for the nearest infected world. We fought lots more Heartless ships, and thankfully none of them were Exchangers. When we arrived at the world, we pressed the "Disembark" button again, getting ourselves spat back out. This time we landed in a desert bazaare. "Where are we?" I asked as I rubbed the sand out of my eyes and brushed myself off.

"I have no idea, but there's a palace up ahead." I followed the direction of her point and saw a really big building with gold tops and marble walls. It certainly looked like a palace, considering its size and appearance. "Let's try there." We were about to begin our walk when we heard a cry for help. We followed it to a street urchin surrounded by monkey-looking things. (I'm not a good describer when it comes to Heartless, but it was Powerwilds and Bouncywilds then.) Those must've been the creatures the doorknob was talking about. I jumped into the area and swung the Keyblade at an approaching monkey. The monkey was thrown back and the man finally noticed me.

"Who are you?" he asked in a friendly voice.

"Who I am is not important right now if you wanna get out alive." He agreed on that. We fought together, destroying the monkeys one-by-one. When we were done, I introduced myself. "My name's Kiara."

"Hey, I remember you! Aren't you the person who saved us all last year?"

"So you know me, too, huh? Not surprised. A lot of people I don't know seem to know me." The man gave me a confused look.

"Hey, Aladdin," Kairi greeted as she walked up to us. "Glad to be back in Agrabah. And sorry, her memory got wiped by Kanapar. Now she can't remember anything about us." The man glared at the mention of Kanapar.

"He's the one behind all this. Not a big surprise, but it doesn't explain why he would wipe someone's memory like that. But it does explain why he took the Sultan." Kairi's jaw dropped as she stared with horror at what she had heard.

"The Sultan of Agrabah got taken?"

"Along with everyone here, except Princess Jasmine."

"Where is she?"

"She told me to lock her in her room. It got fitted to keep the Heartless from sneaking in. So, she told me to shut her in there until it was safe. Then, I came out here to get some water, then I'm attacked by Heartless. And I would've joined the manipulated if it weren't for her." He gestured towards me. I smiled, then I remembered the reason we had come here.

"It's nice to talk to someone here, but we need to find this world's keyhole and seal it," I said.

"Oh, no!" Kairi exclaimed. "We forgot to seal Wonderland!"

"That's the name of the world? Huh, I didn't know that. Anyway, when you guys left me in that one room, I already sealed it. That one's sealed up." Kairi breathed a sigh of relief. "So, Aladdin, do you think you could take us to the keyhole?"

"I don't know where it is, but I do know that Jasmine knows where it is. Let's go see her. I know she won't mind seeing you two again." As we walked down a deserted street towards the palace, I couldn't help but feel like this was just the beginning, and that it would get pretty dangerous along the journey.

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	3. Agrabah

We continued in silence as we walked down the sandy path. Well, I was trudging behind. I was in deep thought about what had happened at the last world. How many more were there? A scream snapped me back into reality. It was a woman. I looked ahead of me-Aladdin and Kairi continued as if they never heard it. Was it Belle? I had heard her scream when no one else did. But the evil monkeys had taken her. Then who was it this time? I turned around and looked for where the sound might've come from. I heard another scream come from above. I looked up-a hole bordered by a green archway stood against one of the walls above the stands. I jumped up and grabbed the canopy of one of the stands. After hoisting myself up, I stepped onto the roof of the store just below. I noticed there were more roofs I could jump to, some had treasure chests. But I had to find out who screamed. I stepped through the hole and into an alley. There were more roofs, one had a red keyhole, but something was out of the ordinary. I knew there was. I looked around at my eye level, then looked down. No wonder this place felt strange, pots with legs sprouted from them were running around.

"Find her!" an angry voice bellowed. I looked directly below me and saw a man in a red and black cape, a black hat, and a golden staff with a jaguar's head and flaming red eyes in his hand. A red parrot sat on his shoulder. "And bring her to me!" The pots instantly ran out through the pathway similar to the one I had been on earlier. The man below laughed evilly. "Won't it be nice to see Princess Jasmine again, Iago?"

"Oh, yes," the bird squawked. "She won't be able to escape us this time."

"Soon, we'll have all the princesses of heart. And our master will be so pleased he'll reward us big time." I gaped at what he said. He _had_ to be a manipulated. But he seemed too powerful for me to handle then. The charm on my bracelet started vibrating. It started glowing softly. I took a step to the side (there was nowhere else to step) and it glowed a little bit brighter. Maybe this would guide me to Jasmine. I continued to make the charm glow brighter as I edged away from the man, who was now talking about finding the other princesses. Man, what a psycho. He was so into his plans he didn't see me slip through the entrance the pots went through. The charm glowed brighter as I got closer to tall, gold gates.

I heard a _whoosh_ sound come from behind. I turned-it was a big, fat, blue bandit wearing a yellow and red vest and pants. It shot a ball of fire from its belly, which zoned in on me. I tried dodging it, but it followed my every move. It hit me. I fell back from the impact. Whoa, who knew that magic could zone in on someone and hit them? I struggled to stand up as the fat bandit stomped his way over to me. Its stomps caused a mini-earthquake with each step, which made standing up even harder. When it was a yard away from me, it squeezed its hands around my throat, slowly lifted me from the ground, and threw me against the wall. I crumpled to the ground in agony. I gasped for breath as the bandit came closer. I thought of the cards again. One of them was a snowflake. Maybe it could extinguish this monster's flame. I checked my pockets for the cards. I pulled them out of my left pocket. I flipped through the cards until I found the one with the snowflake. I dodged another attack as I tried to cast it. Nothing happened. I remembered that I used the other blue cards with the Keyblade. I stared at my wrist and shook it, hoping this would bring the Keyblade back-nothing happened. I gave a confused look at my bracelet. What was going on? I barely dodged another assault as I jumped into a barrel. I felt something underneath me. I pulled out whatever it was from underneath-it was another blue card with a snowflake. There was more than one card? I felt more earthquakes as the bandit stomped this way. I put the two cards together and hoped that they would work this time. I stood up as the cards gave off a bluish light as an iceberg enveloped the creature. After fifteen seconds, the iceberg went away, and the creature collapsed from the lack of energy, yet it was not enough to destroy it. It slowly regained its energy as it stood up. I was ready. I put my faith into the cards as I cast the spell again. This time, after three seconds, the bandit vanished, leaving behind a huge, red treasure chest, similar to the one in Wonderland. Inside, though, there was a glowing blue ball, a Mickey Mouse-shaped keychain, this time it was bordered with brass and the middle was gold, and there were more cards. There was a black one with a picture of the creature that said "Fat Bandit: Increases damage when striking enemies from behind." There was also a green card with a picture of a blue jar with handles and a picture of a green star on it. On the back it said "Potion: Use to normally reload attack cards." I was confused. What did it mean by attack cards? I guessed I'd have to find out later. And there was one more card, a red card with a picture of the Keyblade on it. On the back it said "Kingdom Key: Weakest in the entire game, but because of its small CP and availability will remain in your deck for a while to come." What did it mean by game? Things were getting stranger. Maybe if I could find someone else they could explain it to me. My bracelet went from vibrating to shaking. I remembered the gates. Another scream sounded. It came from behind the gates. Someone was inside.

I kicked at the gates, half-expecting the gates to open. They creaked open a little, just enough for me to squeeze through. In front of me was a marble palace with gold tops. I saw a silhouette in one of the windows above. I squinted so I could get a better view of who, or what, it was, but it was too dark inside for me to tell. I rushed over to the tall, golden doors of the palace, but they wouldn't budge at all. I remembered that one of the blue cards had a picture like a tornado, or at least strong winds. Maybe I could cast a spell of strong winds to break the door. I thrust that one card out in front of me. Winds did appear, but instead of breaking down the door, started spinning around me, making me feel lighter. Soon, I was so light I was flying for real. It felt great. It also got me closer to the window. Soon, I landed on the windowsill and entered the room.

"Who's there?" I heard a soft voice call out. I glanced around the room, but I couldn't find anyone.

"Uh, hello?" I called back. "Is Jasmine here?"

"Why are you here?" the voice asked. "Are you working for them?" I was guessing it was Jasmine.

"Eh, if you mean the manipulated, no. I'm with Kairi and-"

"Kairi? Is she alright?" A lady with black hair pulled back into a loose ponytail with a green headband, a green top with sleeves that fell off her shoulders, green pants, gold shoes, a gold necklace, and gold earrings appeared from under the bed that was in the room.

"Jasmine?"

"Yes, I'm Jasmine. Sorry for not introducing myself properly, but ever since this curse hit the Heartless have been after us."

"Who's us?"

"The Princesses of Light. There are a lot of us, but thankfully only seven of us are known. Unfortunately, we're being tracked down and taken away to who-knows-where. Kairi stole something from the Heartless that prevented them from finding the rest of us, but now she's being hunted down more than any of us. It's a good thing Belle went with her."

"Wait a minute. _Belle_?"

"She's a Princess of Light, too. She went with Kairi to make sure both of them were safe."

"Wait, Kairi's a Princess of Light, too?"

"Yes. I wonder how both of them are doing?"

I didn't know what to say. Should I tell her what happened to Belle? Or should I wait and say nothing? Before either of us could say anything, a thud sounded, as if someone got thrown against a wall. We both looked out the window and saw Kairi stumble a little as she slowly stood up from a big blow. The Powerwilds (short description coming up, finally) and pot Heartless surrounded her, disabling her from escaping. I glared at the creatures. Without any other thought, I jumped out of the window, the charm on my bracelet getting bigger. It was full size as I landed on two pots, crushing them to dust.

"Kairi!" I shouted. "Get out of here!" Kairi ran away as I thrust the Keyblade into a Powerwild. The Powerwilds had dark blue, dark purple, and dark gray fur with yellow around their wrists, black faces, and yellow dots for eyes. There were tons of Powerwilds and pots it was hard to keep up with them. And the heat wasn't helping at all. Hey, if it was really hot here, maybe I could cast another freezing spell. That could help. I searched frantically for the cards with the snowflakes, but I couldn't find them anywhere. I remembered the glowing blue ball. I pulled it out of my pocket and held it in my hand as I did with the glowing red ball. It also pulsed, this time emitting coldness. It also vanished. Concentrating on the ball, I aimed the Keyblade at some pot Heartless, causing them to explode with the sudden blast of ice. They caused a chain reaction and destroyed most of the Powerwilds in the process. Three were left after the others vanished into thin air. They jumped really high in the air and entered through the window to Jasmine's room. I heard a scream come from inside. I slashed at the doors with the Keyblade, and only then did they open up. I entered the palace and ran up the flights of stairs to Jasmine's room. After entering three rooms and the kitchen by mistake, I found her room. I pushed open the door and saw something black disappear below the window. I ran over and looked down-the Powerwilds had Jasmine! I was about to jump down and save her, when I saw the man with the jaguar staff walk in.

"Jafar!" Jasmine shouted in shock and anger.

"Jasmine, how nice to see you again," Jafar greeted evilly. "Iago told me you were talking to some girl about more than one princess of heart…"

"It was _you_ I saw outside the window!" Jasmine hollered back.

"That's right," the bird squawked. "You were talking to a pathetic half-mortal!"

"_What?!?_" Jafar yelled. "You never mentioned anything about that! That's the Pombrooke witch!"

Jasmine acted as if she didn't know that. I gave a double take, too. Kairi, Goofy, and Belle said nothing about me being a witch. Was I not supposed to know this? I leaned a little too far out the window and had to quickly grab onto the ledge to keep from falling. "She'll find the princesses and save them all," Jasmine said with a smile.

"Don't be so sure about that!" Jafar spat. "I'll find her and take care of her myself!"

Jafar turned on his heel and rushed out the gates as Jasmine was dragged away by the Powerwilds. I gave a sigh and I dropped a bit. I looked up-my hand was slipping. I tried to use my other hand to keep me up there, but it was holding the Keyblade. Conveniently, the Keyblade shrunk back to its original form and hung from my bracelet. I grabbed the windowsill with my other hand and pulled myself through. Once I was inside, I slumped down. The only way I was gonna find Jasmine was to find Jafar.

"It's gonna take a miracle for me to catch up with Jafar," I groaned. As if on cue, a purple, blue, and gold carpet appeared right next to me. It seemed to have a life of its own, for it was moving around at its own will. "A magic carpet?" It rose a foot off the ground, as if it wanted me to get on. "Well, why not?" As soon as I got on, though, the carpet took off at a fast speed toward the hot, sandy desert that stretched beyond the city. We had traveled about two minutes, when the carpet dived down to meet two people.

"Kairi! Aladdin!" I shouted. "Nice to see you guys!"

"Nice to see you, too," Aladdin replied, "but we're trying to catch up with a vizier named Jafar."

"Oh, him! I saw him, too!"

"Yeah," Kairi added. "He's on his way to a place called the Cave of Wonders. Good thing you found the magic carpet. Now we can catch up to him."

I made room for the other two, and the carpet took off again. After about five minutes, we came to a stop. There ahead of us was a cave shaped like a lion's head. We entered its mouth and traveled through a lot of winding tunnels until we came to a treasure room.

"Jafar probably went into the Lamp Chamber," Aladdin said, pointing across the room. It was then I heard the voice.

"Kiara!" I looked around; Kairi and Aladdin didn't seem to have heard it.

I hid behind a pile of gold and called out softly to the voice. "Who are you?"

"That doesn't matter now. Jafar is pretty powerful, you'll need all the help you can get." Two small, glowing specks appeared out of nowhere and landed in my hands. One speck felt soft and the other felt like I was touching a cloud. "Take these. Whenever you need help, think of one of the specks and call for it."

"But what are these supposed to do?"

"Kiara?" It was Kairi this time. I peeked out from behind the pile. "What are you doing?"

'This is an awkward moment,' I thought. "Let's put this behind us and take care of Jafar." I went ahead without another word; the other two followed behind, a little confused at what happened. Jafar was on the other side of the room, looking at something. When he heard us come in, he turned around. I glanced at what he saw. It was a giant keyhole.

"Kiara, you have to get over there and lock that hole," Kairi whispered to me.

"I'll take care of you once and for all!" Jafar cried out, thrusting his glowing staff at us. We ducked as a beam of fire almost hit us. Aladdin ran behind Jafar and slashed him with his sword. I snuck over to the keyhole and looked at it. It was too big for me to stick the Keyblade in. How was I gonna lock it?

"Get away from there!" Jafar threw his glowing staff at me. I tried to duck, but it was too late. The burn of two-thousand red-hot knives made me scream in pain.

"Kiara!" The other two rushed to help me, but were blocked by Jafar. As they fought, I remembered the jar with the green leaf I got at Wonderland. It helped me in the hotel, it should help me here. I reached into my pocket and pulled out some of the dust, which swirled around until it turned into the same blue jar. I drank from it, and instantly I felt better.

I remembered the card I had found earlier-the card about the Fat Bandit. I had put it into the Keyblade for safekeeping. Now, I took it out and reread what it said on the back: "Increases damage when striking enemies from behind." Wondering about what to do, I just stood there, holding the card in my hands. It started to tremble, turning into a black mist, which disappeared into the air. I perceived that I had a limited amount of time before this ability was over. I crept up behind Jafar and unleashed a fury of blows using the Keyblade and occasionally fire and blizzard magic. Soon, his attacks came less often and he slowed down. Finally, Aladdin was able to finish him off with a sweep of his sword. Instead of disappearing, he sank beneath the ground, where a rumbling noise came, shaking the ground. A huge hole appeared, and down in that hole, amongst rising platforms and burning lava was a huge red creature with yellow eyes and seemed to get its power from a black lamp that Iago was carrying around.

"Jafar did it again!" Aladdin cried out as he jumped into the pit that had been created a few seconds ago.

'Again?' I thought. Kairi jumped in, too, fighting Jafar alongside Aladdin. 'We need help.' Help? That's it! The voice gave me the two specks for whenever we needed help. I thought of the one that felt like a cloud, asking it over and over in my head to help us. Soon, the Keyblade started shaking as if it was suddenly filled with rambuncious energy. It started shooting out blue smoke and gold sparks. Out of the smoke, a blue creature with a black ponytail and gold wristbands came out. It was a genie! He came down and gave me a high five, all while I was staring at the genie with wide eyes and a surprised look.

"I remember when the previous Keyblade Master made that look," he said in a voice as if he were on a game show, like a host or something. "Now, d'ya need help fightin' ol' Jafar?"

I was wondering about the previous Keyblade Master. Who was it? It also seemed like I was a Keyblade Master. How could I be the master of something I hardly know anything about? I didn't say anything, all I said was, "Yeah, I need help."

"Okay. Hang on, kid, it's gonna be a bumpy ride." I grabbed on to his arm as he flew into the fiery pit. It was so hot in there you could literally fry an egg in there. Maybe a whole meal.

Jafar gave an angry look when he saw the genie and I enter. Aladdin and Kairi looked really pleased, although they had some cuts and bruises. Jafar threw a huge fireball at us. The genie shot ice magic to parry the oncoming attack. "Hey, kid!" he shouted. "See that black lamp the bird's got?" I looked up at Iago and saw the lamp. "Attack it! It's the only way to really defeat this hothead!"

Aladdin and Kairi were helping the genie while I kept trying to attack the bird. He kept flying and darting out of my reach. I thought of the other spark that the voice gave me. I squeezed my eyes shut and concentrated on the spark that had felt soft. Soon, I heard a screeching. I opened my eyes-a monkey was on my head, leaning over to stare at me. It screeched again, now jumping up and down on my head. "Hey, monkey," I said. "Can you help me get the bird up there?"

It saw Iago and immediately jumped up really high. It grabbed onto him and started shaking and pulling him around. Iago was getting dizzy and tired and started to drift toward my reach. The monkey kept hitting him and also started biting him to get him down to my level. Finally he was, and I was able to finish off the lamp. After the last strike, I heard someone yell, then all went white. Soon, in front of me came an image. It started out faint, but became clearer as the seconds passed. I saw it was my sister, Annie, and I, sitting in front of a TV, playing a video game. I didn't remember playing any video games before. I glanced at the TV screen and saw what looked like orange, green, blue, and red blocks put together in an odd way. It was in outer space and was blasting at other odd-looking space ships.

"Good one, Annie!" I heard myself say. "You got 'em!"

"Yeah," my sister replied, "but you're better with gummi ships than I am." I did a double take. Did she say "gummi ship"?

"Well, you need practice. Maybe we can cruise on one next time we go to Kingdom Hearts."

"Mom probably won't like it."

"Yeah, well, she didn't like us having anything to do with Kingdom Hearts 'til two days ago. Now look at the house; it's been Kingdom Hearts-a-fied."

Annie giggled. "Yep. I wonder if we could visit other worlds besides that one market place. Which world was that anyway?"

"Don't know. Maybe next time we go we could ask. Maybe we could also ask Sora to help with the Keyblade." I stared at myself. Did I just say "Keyblade"?

"I wonder why he synthesized it to you and no one else. At first I thought you became the new Keyblade Master." My eyes were really wide now.

"But Sora's the Keyblade Master. He said I was a Keyblade Bearer. He probably did it so Kanapar couldn't get it."

"Maybe. Hey! You made me get hit by the meteor!" On screen, purple meteors were hitting the gummi ship and a green gauge was depleting.

"Not my fault! You gotta be able to do two things at once. You never know when something like this could happen on a real gummi ship."

The memory faded. Everything went back to white. I stood there for about ten minutes in the white area. I soon got really bored. "Okay," I called out to no one in particular. "I saw the memory-thing. Is it possible I can go back now?"

"Not yet," I heard the voice I heard earlier say. I glanced around, but I couldn't see who or what would be speaking.

"Who are you? Come out so I can see who you are!"

"You're not ready to know, but there is something you should know. From now on, a greater enemy will try to stop you from reaching your goal."

"But what is my goal? I never signed up for any of this."

"True. But Sora picked you as the new Keyblade Master, and as such it is now your duty to visit all worlds, lock them, and defeat Kanapar."

"How did I become the new master? And how can I defeat Kanapar? Everyone says I defeated him before, but how?"

"You must find out for yourself. But I will tell you this: the Princesses of Light are being searched for. Keep as many safe as you can."

"And how do I do that?"

"They are not safe in their worlds. You must get them away from their home worlds as soon as possible."

"Just how many princesses are there? And where do I take them?"

"Keep them in the gummi ship until there's a safer place for them to go. And I can't tell you how many there are."

"Eeeeeeeeesh. Well, is there any more I need to know?"

"The Worldblade. Find the Worldblade."

Before I could say anything else, the whiteness started fading away to reveal the fiery pit. Aladdin was still here, so was Kairi, the genie, and the monkey-the only difference was Jafar was human again and Iago was on his shoulder. They seemed to be apologizing for something.

"We didn't mean to," Jafar said. "The curse came so fast we couldn't protect ourselves."

"It's okay," Aladdin reassured. "The good thing is you're back to normal."

"If we find anymore manipulated, we'll let you know," Iago replied.

Kairi noticed I was watching them. She made her way over without letting Jafar, Iago, and Aladdin know. The monkey and the genie came, too. "We have to lock this world," Kairi whispered.

"Yeah, but how do we get out?" I looked up-the opening was at least ten stories up.

"No problem," the genie said. "Hang on tight, folks! The Genie don't came to play!"

He gathered us all up in a blue smoke and silently flew up to the top. Once our feet touched the ground, I looked over at the giant keyhole. 'This has to be it,' I thought. I thrust the Keyblade out in front of me, a white light gathering at the tip. Like in Wonderland, it dashed into the keyhole. I heard something click. Then, there was a rumble, then the entire area was shaking. The Cave of Wonders was collapsing on us!

"Hurry!" Kairi shouted. "Everyone get on the magic carpet!" The magic carpet came speeding to meet us, avoiding stones falling from the ceiling.

"Wait!" I shouted. "What about Aladdin and Jafar?"

"Not a problem!" the Genie shouted. He dove into the pit and quickly came out with everyone. They hopped onto the carpet as well.

"Everybody hold on!" I shouted. We steered the carpet away from the falling stones. The monkey was so scared it was clinging to Aladdin's face.

"Abu!" Aladdin cried out. "This is no time to panic!" He ripped Abu off his face-only to see a huge wall made out of lava in front of us. Stones were falling on either side, and melted treasure started pouring down from above. "Start panicking!"

Everyone screamed as the carpet tried its hardest to avoid the obstacles without a scratch. We finally made it out with a few scratches from the stones. A green and yellow circle was waiting for us, like the one in Wonderland. "You guys go ahead," Aladdin said. "Jafar, Iago, and I will stay here."

"What are you guys gonna do?"

"We're gonna have another meeting."

I gave a confused look. Before I could ask anything, Kairi grabbed my hand and stepped in and out of the circle three times, sending us back to the gummi ship. Genie and Abu made themselves comfortable where Goofy and Belle used to sit. "Should we go back to pick up Goofy?" I asked.

"We should," Kairi agreed. "Let's go back."

We steered away from Agrabah and saw its true appearance-the marble palace with the gold tops, a sandy desert, and the blue Cave of Wonders. I started for Wonderland when enemy gummi ships passed us quickly. We got caught in the updraft and were being pulled away from both worlds. "I can't get control of this!" I shouted. "Something's wrong!"

I tried to steer the ship away, but the updraft was stronger. We got blown away to another darkened shape, another world. "We'll stay here if you need any help," Genie suggested. Abu jumped onto the control pad and pushed a button, sending me and Kairi into the new world. We landed in a forest with a dirt path along the edge.

"Where are we?" I asked.

"No idea. Hey, look at that."

I followed Kairi's point to a fox in a green shirt and hat with a quiver and arrows and a bow being chased by a lion in a blue robe and wearing a gold crown. "Come back here, you miserable outlaw!" the lion shouted.

"I'm only an outlaw because you are the king!" the fox yelled back.

"**_ENOUGH!!! THIS IS THE LAST TIME YOU'LL STEAL ANY GOLD FROM ME!!!_**" The fox was much quicker than the lion, so he outran the lion with ease. He fled into the forest and disappeared into the branches high above. The lion entered the forest to find us. "Have either of you seen that mangy outlaw?" he growled.

We looked at each other in confusion, then back at the lion king. "Who?" Kairi asked.

"**_YOU KNOW WELL WHO, YOU ABSENT-MINDED PEASANT!!! ROBIN HOOD, THE PERSON WHO ALWAYS MANAGES TO ESCAPE WITH MY GOLD!!!_**."

We shook our heads, as a way of saying no and because the lion was really loud. He stormed off. The fox came down from the branches. "Thank you, both of you," he said, taking his hat off and bowing. "My name is Robin Hood."

"You're the one that stole all the money!" I shouted.

"No, no! You've got it all wrong! He's not the real king! He's the brother of King Richard, who's off on the Crusades. Ever since King Richard left, his brother sits on the throne. All he cares about is money, so he raised the taxes so that more and more is taken to him each day. The poor villagers hardly have any money left, so I decided to steal the money from Prince John to feed the poor."

"So is Prince John that lion you were running from?" I asked.

"The one and only."

"Hey, can we help you steal the money?" I asked with a smile.

"Sure, anything for the Pombrooke witch." He turned and started leading us further into the forest. I glanced at Kairi, who had a guilty look for not telling me I was a witch. She looked at me with eyes that said, "I'm _so_ sorry for not telling you sooner."

"It's okay," I whispered back. "I already knew."

"Yes, but I know something about you no one else knows. I should've told you before you found out you were a witch."

"What?"

"You're as special as the Princesses of Light. The Heartless will be coming for you, too."


End file.
